Our Calling

School needs a redesign. Despite the conversation to the contrary, our schools aren’t broken: they are perfectly designed to produce their current results. But we think school can be different.

At The Conscious Schools Project, we think an education that stirs human potential is possible if we’re gutsy enough to imagine teaching and learning differently.  To that end, we partner with schools to explode tired practices and enact new ones.

Our Purpose

Our purpose is to create conscious schools. A conscious school is one that expands freedom and possibility.

  • Freedom. Education done well is a liberating process. The freedom we aspire to is one marked by awareness, skill, and care among students and teachers alike. It is a capacity which allows a person to thrive within changing conditions.

  • Possibility. Conscious teaching and learning happens in the space between ‘what is’ and ‘what is not’. We call this tension possibility. To teach from possibility is to help students be responsible for the present and aware of the perpetually emerging future.

Our Approach

Big Ideas

We host a bold, broad conversation about the potential of conscious teaching and learning practices. Through a mix of written, audio, and live event offerings, we invite educators to learn from one another as they deepen their practice.

Partnership

We partner with schools to offer best-in-class support to schools and school systems. Every leader at Conscious Schools is a school-tested, expert teacher and leader.

Network

Transforming school will require the aligned efforts of good hearts and minds across the country. We create in-person and online spaces where people can connect, exchange ideas, engage in experiments, and grow together

Our People

  • Nathan Smalley, Ph.D.

    FOUNDER

  • Cherese Brauer, M.Ed.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Jessica Escobedo

    CHIEF OF OPERATIONS

  • Melissa Gall, M.Ed.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Jennifer Keyte, M.Ed., MSW, LCSW.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Krzysztof Piekarski, Ph.D.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Aja Settles, M.Ed.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Carlo Schmidt, M.Div.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT

  • Lauren Whitfield, Ed.D.

    SENIOR CONSULTANT